October 26, 2011

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MSNBC host Rev. Al Sharpton goes out to dinner twice a year with Bill O’Reilly and speaks regularly with Sean Hannity — but he draws the line at dining with Glenn Beck.

In an interview with The Atlantic on his media diet, the “PoliticsNation” anchor revealed he is an avid media consumer: He subscribes to five newspapers a day, regularly drops $25 at magazine newsstands and Googles himself daily. But the interactions with Fox News personalities reveal that hosts on ideologically divided, competing networks can still find common ground.

Now Glenn Beck, he gets under my skin. A lot of what he says is so irritating, I don't understand why people watch. He just bothers me. There are others I disagree with, but they're not as aggravating. Take Bill O'Reilly. I don't agree with him, but he's intelligent and I can have a conversation with him. As a matter of fact, we go to dinner together twice a year. We'll go uptown one time and downtown the other. We've been to Sylvia's, Amy Ruth's and The Harvard Club. He's a smart person that just sees the world differently than me. We can actually talk. I even talk to Sean Hannity from time to time. But I could not find myself eating dinner with Glenn Beck.

Sharpton and O’Reilly certainly have a professional relationship, debating occasionally on “The O’Reilly Factor.” In March 2010, the two held a spirited debate on charges of racism in the tea party movement, five months later the topic was Beck’s “Restoring Honor” rally. In April, after President Barack Obama appeared with Sharpton at a rally, the reverend was back on O’Reilly’s show. It was known they had supped together — though perhaps not as regularly as revealed to The Atlantic — after O’Reilly was somewhat unimpressed with the atmosphere at Sylvia’s during a dinner with the reverend in 2007.

As for Beck? Sharpton didn’t exactly boycott Beck’s program when it was on Fox News — he appeared on Beck’s show in April 2010. Though the two agreed that they disagree on just about everything, there was mutual respect throughout that segment, with a polite “thank you sir” from Beck and a “good to see you” from Sharpton at the end of it. Four months later, Sharpton was organizing a counter-rally to Beck’s “Restoring Honor.”

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